a tokyo native, ken ishii made his musical debut in 1993 on r&s records . his debut release, ‘ garden on the palm' , hit no.1 on the nme techno chart, and gained critical acclaim as one of the most innovative and experimental works in contemporary techno. however it was the release of his first album ‘ jelly tones' in 1995 which really brought his name to the attention of a much wider public both in europe and in his native japan

the first single from the album ‘ extra' came complete with a ground breaking manga style video directed by none other than kouji morimoto ( director of the world famous ‘akira' ) which won the mtv dance music video of the year at the muzik awards in the same year. not content with breaking down the barriers on the video front ishii also became one of the first artists working in the ‘dance arena' to take his music out of the studio and perform live on tour starting a trend that a number of other successful dance acts were to subsequently follow. in 1998 , ishii was chosen by the international olympic committee to produce the main opening and closing theme for the winter olympics in nagano . the theme featured in the broadcast of the olympic games to over 70 countries around the world.

1999 brought the release of ‘sleeping madness' the first ken ishii album to feature collaborations with other artists. as a result the album featured an eclectic mixture of musical styles and influences with the collaborations being chosen from ken's wide circle of friends in the musical community ; talvin singh , mike ladd and dj spooky being amongst the contributors. once again, more barriers were broken down critics raved, and ken took the live show out on the road, playing fuji rock , japans biggest festival as well as london, paris, berlin and brussels.

and there was to be no let up the following year. in the space of those particular 12 months ken played live shows at the reading festival , transmusicales in france and many other major european festivals. he also picked up a dj residency at new york 's legendary twilo not to mention appearing in japanese vogue and on the front cover of newsweek .

2001 was set to be yet another great year for ken. his album ‘ flatspin' featured a collaboration with kevin saunderson's inner city and once again the album gained blinding reviews and more shows were performed in the uk and the rest of europe .

ken has been touring a lot for the last 12 months, performing live in europe with a percussionist, did recordings for flr for reel musiq , tv commercials and a playstation2 game which has been released and become a best seller already in japan. the original soundtrack album ‘rez - gamer's guide to...' is to be released soon.

ken is returning in 2003 with his fifth studio album ‘future in light' due out for release in april via eclectic/leftfield label exceptional records . with this album ken ishii is going back to his techno roots - reminiscent of early detroit , the album combines the best elements of that era with current technology. the end result is a mind-blowing sonic journey of melodies, harmonies and funkiness wrapped up in ken's trademark solid, relentless beats. as ken describes, he wanted to make an album representative of his improvised live sets in a club environment but that would also make pleasant and interesting listening at home. ‘future in light' looks set to break out of the specialist, purist techno circles and reach a much wider audience while maintaining its underground credibility.

you can also visit exceptional records' website at www.exceptionalrecords.co.uk and ken ishii's website www.kenishii.com